Ups and Downs

    Life is full of ups and downs, but the last six months have been a roller coaster ride! Perhaps it's because this is the first time I've been away from my family for so long, maybe it's just because dog mushing is full of unexpected challenges and rewards. Either way, I've learned a ton about myself, made mistakes and sought to repair them with God's help.

    After the Iditarod start, I had three more training runs before my race - the Two Rivers 200/Chatanika Challenge. Scott and I got drop bags done and I trudged through the training runs with my team - who were obviously as bored of the trail as I was. I was looking forward to getting on some new trails and experiencing the Alaskan sled dog racing atmosphere...everything was set and going great.
    And then came the hammer blow! The morning we were going to leave for the race, I checked my e-mails to find out that the race was postponed for a week. We'll just say I was a bit distraught. All I'd trained for all winter, the reward for handling, gone in a moment...because my flight home was scheduled for March 17th.
    I looked into re-scheduling my flight, but airfare prices were ridiculous - probably because of all the Iditarod traffic - and with a heavy heart, I realized I'd have to forgoe the race. I'm pretty resigned to it now, especially as I look forward to returning to Idaho - I did enjoy training and working with the dogs here and I'd never put 1,800 miles on my team in one season before.

    But the saga doesn't stop there. Leila, who qualified for the Yukon Quest this year, was still in Alaska and will be taking the yearlings in the race this weekend in my stead. I'm very glad they will get to see a new trail and so excited to watch Leila run because while I can go home and run dogs whenever I want to (all summer on the 4-wheeler, if the weather allows!) she only has these winter months to gain experience and spend hours on the back of a dogsled. It's a new trail, a new team and should be a great time...I'll be waiting eagerly to hear how it went and see how the yearlings do.

    So, my last week has been spent helping Leila get ready as well as packing up for the trip home. It's going to be a crazy weekend - my flight is Saturday morning but I may get to the airport extremely early (try, 3am) so that Scott can get to the second checkpoint for the Two Rivers race - this isn't really a handler assisted race, but the handlers have to clean up after their team and deliver drop bags to their team. We'll see how it goes, one thing is for certain: I probably won't be that rested when I get home!